ASUS GeForce RTX 3070 TUF Gaming OC Review 27

ASUS GeForce RTX 3070 TUF Gaming OC Review

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Introduction

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We review the ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3070 OC, which is the company's second fastest custom-design implementation of NVIDIA's latest performance-segment GPU, the other being ROG STRIX. The TUF Gaming brand received a spectacular upcycle with the GeForce RTX 30-series. We were extremely happy with the TUF Gaming RTX 3080 in our review. ASUS decided to use the same cooling solution on the new RTX 3070. The card combines a ruggedized metal body with a trio of Axial Tech fans and an airy cooling solution with vents at just the right places. There's also a nice factory overclock to be had.

The GeForce RTX 3070 is an important product for NVIDIA as it offers more than double the performance per dollar than the RTX 2080 Ti, and NVIDIA claims the RTX 3070 even beats it. This would mean the RTX 3070 is able to do the same things as the RTX 2080 Ti—maxed out gaming at 1440p with RTX-on, and 4K UHD gaming with reasonably high settings, including mid-tier settings of RTX. This would bring 4K UHD gaming to an even wider audience while also delivering high refresh-rate gaming to the 1440p and 1080p e-sports segments. At the heart of the RTX 3070 is the new 8 nm "GA104" silicon, which is much smaller than the "GA102" that powers the RTX 3080 and RTX 3090. The RTX 3070 nearly maxes out the "GA104." NVIDIA cut costs where it could by giving this card the same 8 GB of 14 Gbps, 256-bit GDDR6 memory as the RTX 2070. For the full details on RTX 3070 technology and architecture, refer to our RTX 3070 Founders Edition article.



As we mentioned earlier, the TUF Gaming RTX 3070 OC in this review looks like an enthusiast-segment product for its price, and you could easily mistake it for the TUF Gaming RTX 3080 when installed. ASUS is combining the highly capable cooling solution with a GPU that has a typical board power of just 220 W at reference clocks, which at the factory-overclocked speeds, should barely bother this cooler. An overkill cooling solution that hopefully translates to lower noise levels.

The latest TUF Gaming board design involves a large aluminium fin-stack heatsink that's ventilated by a trio of Axial Tech fans. The PCB is shorter than the heatsink itself, and ASUS has given the card's metal backplate a large cutout for much airflow from one of the three fans go right through, a concept not unlike NVIDIA's "dual axial flow-through" industrial design for its RTX 30-series Founders Edition cards. Out of the box, the TUF Gaming RTX 3070 OC comes with factory-overclocked speeds of 1815 MHz GPU Boost (compared to 1725 MHz reference), which means the GPU may be pulling slightly more power than its stock 220 W rating. In this review, we take the ASUS TUF Gaming GeForce RTX 3070 OC for a spin to tell you if paying a $40 premium over NVIDIA's $499 baseline price for the RTX 3070 makes sense.

GeForce RTX 3070 Market Segment Analysis
 PriceShader
Units
ROPsCore
Clock
Boost
Clock
Memory
Clock
GPUTransistorsMemory
RX 5700$3302304641465 MHz1625 MHz1750 MHzNavi 1010300M8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
GTX 1080$3302560641607 MHz1733 MHz1251 MHzGP1047200M8 GB, GDDR5X, 256-bit
RTX 2060 Super$3802176641470 MHz1650 MHz1750 MHzTU10610800M8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RX Vega 64$400 4096641247 MHz1546 MHz953 MHzVega 1012500M8 GB, HBM2, 2048-bit
GTX 1080 Ti$6503584881481 MHz1582 MHz1376 MHzGP10212000M11 GB, GDDR5X, 352-bit
RX 5700 XT$3702560641605 MHz1755 MHz1750 MHzNavi 1010300M8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RTX 2070$3402304641410 MHz1620 MHz1750 MHzTU10610800M8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RTX 2070 Super$4502560641605 MHz1770 MHz1750 MHzTU10413600M8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
Radeon VII$6803840641802 MHzN/A1000 MHzVega 2013230M16 GB, HBM2, 4096-bit
RTX 2080$6002944641515 MHz1710 MHz1750 MHzTU10413600M8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RTX 2080 Super$6903072641650 MHz1815 MHz1940 MHzTU10413600M8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RTX 2080 Ti$10004352881350 MHz1545 MHz1750 MHzTU10218600M11 GB, GDDR6, 352-bit
RTX 3070$5005888961500 MHz1725 MHz1750 MHzGA10417400M8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
ASUS RTX 3070
TUF Gaming OC
$5405888961500 MHz1815 MHz1750 MHzGA10417400M8 GB, GDDR6, 256-bit
RTX 3080$7008704961440 MHz1710 MHz1188 MHzGA10228000M10 GB, GDDR6X, 320-bit
RTX 3090$1500104961121395 MHz1695 MHz1219 MHzGA10228000M24 GB, GDDR6X, 384-bit
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